Interpersonal Factors

   One factor that can come into play when looking at someone's physical activity is the influence of family and friends on the person. If a person is raised in a family that is very physically active, he or she might not be at as high of a risk as someone who is raised to live a sedentary lifestyle. Similarly, when a person associates his or herself with people who are very physically active, he or she may be influenced by this. He or she could very well become more engaged in physical activity compared to someone who is friends with people who do not do vigorous or moderate physical activity. A study was done on this topic by the Division of Cancer Control and Population Sciences. What was looked at was the impact that family and friends has on one's physical activity level. It was shown that if an exericise is done alone, it is more likely to be vigorous than if it is done with more than one person. However, a conclusion was made that the more people are involved in the activity, the longer it will be. I think it is important for us, as health educators, to encourage our students and clients to bring in physical activity to their social settings. Many different activities can be fun and healthy at the same time, and we need to give the people we are educating good ideas of what they can do to make their exercise fun.
   I think that the influence of family and friends on one's physical activity can be either extremely positive or extremely negative. If someone is not encouraged enough to become physically active, he or she may be at a higher risk of being obese. According to the study done by the Cancer Prevention Fellowship Program, people who were encouraged by their family and friends to live a healthy lifestyle were less likely to be at risk for becoming obsese. These people had a fat intake that was significantly less than the people who did not have the positive encouragement to live a healthy and active lifestyle. One job we have, as health educators, is to encourage people who do not have a strong social support to become engaged in physical activity and to eat correctly. If a person does not have close ties with his or her family, we need to be the people who can push them a bit further into becoming healthier.